Oprah Summer Reads 14-k Gold Giveaway

In February, T.S. Poetry Press, known for poetry and memoirs, published its first novel, The Whipping Club by Deborah Henry. It is the story of a child placed for adoption, and years later, his birth parents learn that he wasn’t adopted as they had been told, but is in an orphanage – an institution that is more about child abuse than child care.

“Deborah Henry is a natural storyteller and she is far more, ” says Pulitzer Prize-winning author Robert Olen Butler. “Her novel The Whipping Club is a compelling read, but it also seriously explores the terrible ways the world –as a society, as individuals—often fails its children. And most importantly, her book offers a searingly lovely vision of how wrongs can be made right. Deborah Henry is a splendid young novelist who deserves a wide audience.”

The novel is about to get that audience. This week, O Magazine—O as in Oprah—published its list of the 29 hottest reads for the summer – and The Whipping Club is on the list.

It made the O List. O my goodness.

Here at TweetSpeak Poetry, we’re celebrating Deborah Henry’s book and its O-list recognition. Like the secrets buried in The Whipping Club, we’re burying some secret words – secret O words.

Three different words will be available in our blog posts each day. For example, you might see #Oprah, and you might see #Ovation, and you might see #Onyx. Or three other O words. (Personally, I like the word #Oleander.) Look for the hashtag symbol (#) in front of an O word.

Then write a poem or take a picture, using or illustrating the secret word. Post the poem or picture on your blog, Twitter, or Facebook, with a link back to this post. Then stop in and share your post link with us in this comment box, and you’ll be entered in the 14-k-gold-secret giveaway (one necklace—winner’s choice—from the options below). Multiple entries, each using a different secret word, are perfectly acceptable.

The contest ends on Friday – this Friday, June 15, at 9 p.m. Eastern time. One winner will be picked at random and announced here at TweetSpeak on Monday, June 18. The more you share, the more chances you have to win! Just remember to link to us and to come back and share your post link with us HERE.

In addition to the O secret word contest, for two weeks only, the Kindle price of The Whipping Club will be $2.99. (I bought mine yesterday.)

Congratulations to Deborah Henry and T.S. Poetry Press. And start looking for those secret O words.

It only takes one person of influence to garner the attention of distracted bystanders. So happy Oprah noticed the book and shouted it to the masses. Yay! Wish I was a poet, I would join the party here. I’ll just linger in the creativity of others.

Outside of myself
I can see how
The wind blows
Breath into me,
But can’t seem
To see how
Breath in me
Can erase the cacophony
Of deep-hued memories
Of my being
Though knowing
Such breath,
I pulse towards
My innermost calling
To free myself to be

I can’t find the words
to play.
Oh! You said to check
the post today.
Just look for words
that start with #O,
which you will find in
the link below.
I’m blind and daft,
how I feel #OLD
I’ll go to link that you did show.

Darn. I honestly cannot figure out how this contest works. I click “blog” and it takes me back to the home page, referencing a daily blog that I can’t seem access. Are we supposed to be using the words #Oprah, #Ovation, #Onyx, or #Oleander? I was making the assumption those were examples and that the “real” secret words would be found elsewhere, but where? I am #obscured, #out-of-it, and #overwrought! Can you #oblige?

It’s easy to imagine something astounding
if only we would take the time to look.
Sadly, I only glimpsed.
Time marches on, and it’s in those
happy hours of slumber,
when the imagination flashes…
like Galvani’s spark, that
in blink of an eye
the past, present, and
future no longer have
restraints of time.

Solitude is the operation
of the soul in search of itself.
It’s in the dead center
of soundlessness
that vitality’s insistent
reminder can be heard.
The crunch of ant feet
descending into dust,
their mission mandated
by singular intelligence,
beating a rhythm
that the soul knows.

Oxford cloth shirts are as indestructible
as he believed his career to be.
His was a buttoned-down theology
of work, an ethic that took the starch
and rendered crisp collared authority
its due. Locked from his office,
he slumped in the pile of rumpled
threads waiting for someone
to see his worth, restore his press.

Rosanne, just a quick note… the entries must be posted elsewhere and link back here to qualify for the contest. Other than that, we simply welcome your poems (and that’s no simple thing either, is it? 🙂

Oh! Such dilemma!
Over Oxford comma
Old country of mine
Says,
‘Lose it not!’
Others say,
‘In the gutter!
Too much clutter!’
Haters love the brevity
Lovers, the history
Or perhaps utility?
This serial comma,
Such an innocent fella,
Breathes such life
In naysayers,
Yet breeds
So strongly
Among players
This English mystery,
To everyone’s worry,
Is still very much alive
In World’s ever-changing drive

“Oprah Summer Reads 14-k Gold Giveaway – Tweetspeak Poetry” was indeed a delightful
post, can’t help but wait to go through much more of your blogs.
Time to waste a lot of time on-line lol. Thanks for your effort
,Jillian

[…] I had done this on the exact date, one year later, as when I had offered gold in celebration of our T.S. Poetry Press Oprah appearance. June 12, 2012, Oprah. June 12, 2013, an Olympic-sized editorial cut and post, by an editor with […]